§17Expeditionem unam omnino suscepit eamque modicam.
He undertook only one expedition, and that a modest one.
cum decretis sibi a senatu ornamentis triumphalibus leuiorem maiestati principali titulum arbitraretur uelletque iusti triumphi decus, unde adquireret Britanniam potissimum elegit, neque temptatam ulli post Diuum Iulium et tunc tumultuantem ob non redditos transfugas.
Since he thought the triumphal ornaments decreed to him by the senate too light a title for imperial majesty, and wished for the honor of a regular triumph, he chose Britain as the best place from which to acquire it, a land neither attempted by anyone after the deified Julius, and at that time in a state of tumult because of refugees who had not been given back.
huc cum ab Ostia nauigaret, uehementi circio bis paene demersus est, prope Liguriam iuxtaque Stoechadas insulas.
When he was sailing thither from Ostia, he was nearly shipwrecked twice by a violent northwest wind, near Liguria and close to the Stoechades islands.
quare a Massilia Gesoriacum usque pedestri itinere confecto inde transmisit ac sine ullo proelio aut sanguine intra paucissimos dies parte insulae in deditionem recepta, sexto quam profectus erat mense Romam rediit triumphauitque maximo apparatu.
Therefore, having completed his journey by land from Massilia as far as Gesoriacum, he crossed over from there and, without any battle or bloodshed, having received part of the island into surrender within a very few days, he returned to Rome in the sixth month after he had set out, and celebrated a triumph with the greatest pomp.
ad cuius spectaculum commeare in urbem non solum praesidibus prouinciarum permisit, uerum etiam exulibus quibusdam; atque inter hostilia spolia naualem coronam fastigio Palatinae domus iuxta ciuicam fixit, traiecti et quasi domiti Oceani insigne.
For the spectacle of this, he permitted not only the governors of the provinces to come to the city, but even certain exiles; and among the spoils taken from the enemy, he fixed a naval crown on the roof of the Palatine house next to the civic crown, as a sign of the Ocean crossed and, as it were, subdued.
currum eius Messalina uxor carpento secuta est; secuti et triumphalia ornamenta eodem bello adepti, sed ceteri pedibus et in praetexta, M. Crassus Frugi equo phalerato et in ueste palmata, quod eum honorem iterauerat.
His wife Messalina followed his chariot in a carriage; those who had obtained triumphal ornaments in the same war also followed, but while the rest did so on foot and in the toga praetexta, Marcus Crassus Frugi followed on a caparisoned horse and in a palm-embroidered robe, because he had repeated that honor.
§18Vrbis annonaeque curam sollicitissime semper egit.
He always took care of the city and its grain supply with the utmost solicitude.
cum Aemiliana pertinacius arderent, in diribitorio duabus noctibus mansit ac deficiente militum ac familiarum turba auxilio plebem per magistratus ex omnibus uicis conuocauit ac positis ante se cum pecunia fiscis ad subueniendum hortatus est, repraesentans pro opera dignam cuique mercedem.
When the Aemiliana district burned with unusual persistence, he stayed in the Diribitorium for two nights, and as the crowd of soldiers and household slaves was failing to help, he summoned the plebeians from all the districts through the magistrates, and having placed money-chests before him, exhorted them to assist, paying on the spot a worthy reward to each according to his labor.
artiore autem annona ob assiduas sterilitates detentus quondam medio foro a turba conuiciisque et simul fragminibus panis ita infestatus, ut aegre nec nisi postico euadere in Palatium ualuerit, nihil non excogitauit ad inuehendos etiam tempore hiberno commeatus.
But when the grain supply was tightened on account of continuous crop failures, he was once so beset in the middle of the forum by a mob with abuse and at the same time with fragments of bread, that he was barely able to escape to the Palatine, and only by a back door; whereupon he left nothing unthought of to bring in supplies even in the winter season.
nam et negotiatoribus certa lucra proposuit suscepto in se damno, si cui quid per tempestates accidisset, et naues mercaturae causa fabricantibus magna commoda constituit pro condicione cuiusque: §19ciui uacationem legis Papiae Poppaeae, Latino ius Quiritium, feminis ius IIII liberorum; quae constituta hodieque seruantur.
For he both proposed certain profits to merchants, taking the loss upon himself if anything should happen to anyone through storms, and established great advantages for those who built ships for the purpose of trade, according to each one's condition: for a citizen, exemption from the Lex Papia Poppaea; for a Latin, the citizenship of Rome; for women, the right of four children; which regulations established then are observed even to this day.
§20Opera magna potius †quam necessaria quam multa perfecit, sed uel praecipua: ductum aquarum a Gaio incohatum, item emissarium Fucini lacus portumque Ostiensem, quanquam sciret ex iis alterum ab Augusto precantibus assidue Marsis negatum, alterum a Diuo Iulio saepius destinatum ac propter difficultatem omissum.
He completed great rather than necessary, or rather than many, public works, but the chief among them were: the aqueduct begun by Gaius, likewise the outlet of Lake Fucinus, and the harbor of Ostia; although he knew that of these, one had been denied by Augustus to the Marsi who assiduously entreated him, and the other had been often intended by the deified Julius but abandoned on account of its difficulty.
Claudiae aquae gelidos et uberes fontes, quorum alteri Caeruleo, alteri Curtio et Albudigno nomen est, simulque riuum Anienis noui lapideo opere in urbem perduxit diuisitque in plurimos et ornatissimos lacus.
He brought the cold and abundant springs of the Claudian water—one of which is named Caeruleus, the other Curtius and Albudignus—and at the same time the stream of the New Anio, into the city by stone masonry, and distributed them into very many and beautifully decorated reservoirs.
Fucinum adgressus est non minus conpendii spe quam gloriae, cum quidam priuato sumptu emissuros se repromitterent, si sibi siccati agri concederentur.
He undertook the Fucinus project with no less hope of profit than of glory, since certain individuals promised to drain it at private expense, if the reclaimed lands were granted to them.
per tria autem passuum milia partim effosso monte partim exciso canalem absoluit aegre et post undecim annos, quamuis continuis XXX hominum milibus sine intermissione operantibus.
He completed the channel through three miles, partly by digging through and partly by cutting away the mountain, with difficulty and after eleven years, although thirty thousand men worked continuously without intermission.
portum Ostiae extruxit circumducto dextra sinistraque brachio et ad introitum profundo iam solo mole obiecta; quam quo stabilius fundaret, nauem ante demersit, qua magnus obeliscus ex Aegypto fuerat aduectus, congestisque pilis superposuit altissimam turrem in exemplum Alexandrini Phari, ut ad nocturnos ignes cursum nauigia dirigerent.
He built the harbor of Ostia by throwing out arms on the right and left, and constructing a breakwater at the entrance in deep water; to make the foundation of this more secure, he first sank the ship which had brought the great obelisk from Egypt, and having piled up piers, erected upon them a very high tower after the model of the Pharos of Alexandria, so that vessels might direct their course by its night lights.